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Monday, July 23, 2012

July 23, 2012: What is it about Glen Campbell I love so much, anyway?! It's a rhetorical question, and I'm never sure whether you're supposed to put a question mark, so I always compensate by putting both an exclamation mark AND a question mark. How's that for conscientious?! (See?!)

Anyway, it's my kind of morning -- heavy rain, moody clouds and lots of thunder. The cats are being pleasant -- that is, the little cat is being sweet and friendly, but the fat one followed up pooping on the basement floor by vomiting in the kitchen. Still, they're better than some people I know, who poop everywhere!

And speaking of poop, I was recalling this great comment John Lennon made in some documentary, wherein he references that the quality of a given song he'd written on some day may have just been the result of his having had a good (dare I say, sound) bowel movement that day. And it makes sense, if you think about it. After all, what myriad details of living craft the precarious state of my emotions at any given time?!

For instance, this thunderstorm just set me straight, and now that it's clearing up I'm getting depressed. Frequent Blah-ugh! readers will (or won't) recall that I favor British weather to the skin-burning sun of modern summer, and any chance to be enveloped by the lovely hydraulic gauze of nature's natural sprinkler is, for me, just peachy keen.

On another note, I'm sitting here nude right now, as some of my regular Blah-ugh! readers may (or may not) realize, and I'm wondering if the front door being open constitutes my being some kind of public spectacle. It's certainly not my intention, as my regular Blah-ugh! readers would (or wouldn't) understand. It's just that I was about to shower when I was sucked into listening to this Glen Campbell album and felt compelled to let you know -- my regular (and irregular) Blah-ugh! readers -- that Glen is among the most underrated performers of the 20th century. Certainly, his is among my five all-time favorite singing voices, the others being Lennon, Lulu, Brian Wilson and Sam Cooke.

Anyway, I've got to go now. Put that in your pipe and smoke it! Don't forget to buy my Youtube video at this location, and watch "Space Case" if and when you've got the nerve ... And keep watching the flagpoles, because I note they're STILL all at half-mast and I have no F***ING idea why!

Monday, July 16, 2012

July 16, 2012: I noticed something odd the other day. (And why should we be surprised to find odd things, what with Washington airports being named after Iran-Contra Scandal principals, and Watergate perpetrators being put on stamps?! ... No, nothing surprises me anymore. I don't even surprise myself, except when I come out of the shower, and then it's more shock than anything ...)

Still, this was -- and is -- always odd to me these days. Flags, I mean -- public flags, and the fact that they always seem to be at half-mast. Yes, once again, just last week, I walked (or perhaps skulked is the right word) past a public flagpole -- you know the kind, all straight and white and tall and public -- and there, once again, was a flag left hanging halfway up the pole, and for some reason I still can't quite grasp.

Once upon a time -- it seems so long ago now, when people were people, and not robots, and stamps were 10 cents, or 13 cents, and people licked them for the sheer pleasure of it, and not just to "send" ... Well, back then flags were almost always at the tops of flagpoles where they belonged. It was a rare occasion -- a dark, shared-public-consciousness kind of day -- when some serious death occurred in America that brought the flag back to mid-strife -- presidents or Miss America finalists -- and we walked around for a couple of solid numb days going "ooh" and respectfully mooing "moo," all sublime in our solemnity, like a bunch of sterile coconuts.

But now -- or so it seems to me -- that stupid flag is always fluttering halfway up the flagpole, and I really can't figure out why. After last week's afternoon of inspired contemplation, I finally concluded it had to do with the untimely death of Ernest Borgnine, and then for a few minutes it all made sense ...

But then I began to wonder why was it always at half-mast so often times before his dying. I mean, what am I to conclude? (And by the way, what are you to conclude? What are any of us to conclude, except that these Blah-ugh! entries get worse and worse, and our money would be better spent on fresh copies of "Space Case" by Jarret Liotta (meaning me) (available through Amazon).(Yes, yes. It's all true!))

Anyway, I don't remember what my point was, except you can't trust anything these days, even our founding father flag. I suspect that eventually we'll learn certain corporations are paying significant amounts of money to keep the flags half-masted in the hopes of marketing something. Flags perhaps. It may simply be that Wal-Mart can sell more flags in the summertime if they're kept closer to the crowd so the rabble can grasp them quicker and find motivation to get out and buy more ...

I don't know. It's just one theory, good as another ... Peace out! R.I.P. Ernie!

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

July 4, 2012: Silly me, in my last Blah-ugh! post I stupidly called ODD "EDD." Those of you who read (or are reading) "Space Case" will see that I still have "EEDs" on my mind, thus the mistake is understandable, given MY mind. But I'll set the record straight now, for an EED is an "Experiential Experience Drone" (see SC, which is "Space Case"), ODD is "Oppositional Defiance Disorder" and EDD ... Well, I don't know what the hell that is, but it doesn't matter ...

ODD is what I wanted to talk about, and I'm sitting here still reeling, rocking and rolling (my eyes, that is) because I can't believe that the medical world could create such a RIDICULOUS diagnosis ...

And yet, as my readers know (assuming they've been paying attention to me), nothing should surprise us in this ass-backward world. Why wouldn't the alleopathic medical community -- the psych world in particular, which favors over-medicating the whole human race for residuals and travel junkets paid by the pharmaceutical industry -- create some official disorder for what is, I'm sure, in almost all cases the simple bratty behavior of children fostered by poor, ineffectual and somewhat stupid parenting.

I know how it happened. Some wealthy family, who'd created an incredibly spoiled, out-of-control kid, DEMANDED of their high-priced child psychologist that they "fix" him (or her).

"Bull!" the parents shouted, projecting the same solid immovable righteous resolve that works so well in corporate business meetings, and with Hispanic gardeners, respectively. "We're paying you to fix him, so do it."

"Well, I can medicate him. Owing to the fact that he's an up-and-coming sociopath, it's reasonable to get this kid on some drugs, but--"

"Yes, but we can't have any labels," the mother moaned, as she was one to do at the oddest of times. "Certainly not any that could plague him later in politics, or when he goes to Yale."

"Yes, I concur," the father concurred. (He was always concurring, especially when his wife wasn't around.) "He needs a broader diagnosis. Something more befitting a Bushwacker."

"Well," the therapist began hesitantly, "I'm not sure there ..."

"Perhaps we can help move this thing forward with your help," the father said, getting his checkbook out with the dramatic relish he often showed when concurring.

The therapist, who always needed more money to fund his gambling and pornography addictions, grew quite reasonable in quite a quick moment. "Hmm, well ... Y'know, for a long time I've wondered why the DSM-IV wasn't recognizing some of the more subtle afflictions that seem to plague the one percent, meaning you kind folks."

He accepted the remarkably large check with a humble warm feeling in and about his genitals.

"In fact," he said, waxing patriotic, "I think it's an authentic tragedy that afflicted young people, like your child -- so misunderstood and-and-and unappreciated -- that they should go through life being shunned and held accountable for their behavior, when in fact they're not doing anything wrong ... at least, they shouldn't be held accountable. It's this disorder, damnit! This damn disorder of-of-of defiance and-and ...

"Wait! I've got it! Your son is suffering from a Defiance Disorder, which is why he's oppositional. My god, it's a revelation! He's not a spoiled brat, who's grown up with no boundaries, no healthy limits set by healthy attentive parents who were present in his life ... He's a victim! A victim of an Oppositional Defiance Disorder!"

The parents were pleased, as was the therapist, who vowed to move forward in lobbying all the official governing agencies to get their kid the diagnosis he deserved ... Yes, it was a great day for the Bushwacker family ... and another typical day in the psychiatric community at large!

NOTE: If you enjoyed the fluid joyful journey of this renegade writing sample, you'll love the virulent prose of my new novel SPACE CASE. It's the witty and vaguely disturbing tale of somebody who does something, and then some other people get involved in some other ways too ... It's great!